I have started to build a system/circuit to capture old cine 8/super 8 using the Cinecap programme.

I am having trouble to get the IR receiver being triggered when a white blade moves passed the IR receiver.

(There are three blades of which I have painted one white i.e. 2 black blades will pass before the white blade is supposedly required to trigger the system)

For the system I used the following-
A cine projector that can run as slow as 3 frames per second (Eumig 610D).

The moment that the frame "stops" for a split second, you need your camcorder to record the image and these frames are put together by the Cinecap into an AVI file. So when the frame stops, a trigger needs to be activated. In this case an IR receiver is the trigger.
(I also tried with a microswitch, but the capturing was erratic)

My video camera is a 3CCD Panasonic NV GS250

I have done the following: I converted a mouse (acknowledge James Rueben):

The IR receiver and all my connections (converted mouse; circuit board) are working well.

My finger, or any white paper triggers a signal which captures a frame via my camcorder on Cinecap, BUT, the paper, my finger, etc need to be very close to the surface of the IR receiver to trigger the signal.

As mentioned before, I painted one of the three blades white, which will hopefully be triggered by the white blade going past.(acknowledge James Rueben):

It only works when I bring the IR receiver very close to the stationary blade.

If the blade rotates at 3fps, it does not trigger a signal, although I bring the receiver quite close.

What is the solution?:

I can see two possibilities
1. Either put something on the blade ? white paper, other material which the IR receiver will pick up (this is where I need advice and this will be the easiest),
2. Or get a stronger?? IR receiver.

I feel that there must be a way to produce a strong input by means of some material to create the trigger. I used PVA paint.

Sorry for the delay in response. I was a quite busy and am just having a bit of time to look through the data sheet you provided.

That sensor needs to be very close to what it is reading. The diagram in the data sheet shows the measured item .11 inches away from the internal sensor. There is also .05 inches of material between the internal sensor and the outside of the case so that means that the measured item needs to be .05 inches from the front of the sensor housing (1.27mm). So it sounds like your experimental results are correct.

Based on the 1.7 volt forward voltage on the LED you are driving it at around 18.3mA which is close to the 20mA that the data sheet tests were performed at but you may get a bit better results if you increase the current a bit, there is a 50mA max so there is lots of room to play. If you want I would aim for around 30mA.

I have always been a fan of the sensors that have a tab that goes into them and breaks a beam. The concept is the same as your sensor but instead of looking for reflected light it looks for the beam being broken by something opaque. This may make it a bit more reliable but I am not familiar with the setup so there may be something that prevents this from being used.

Thanks for the reply. I have had some other responses from other websites, so you might want to comment.

With regards to pick up, I have had advice as follows;

-Use an IR light or LED light and mount it so that it shines on the white blade
-Either paint the blade aluminum, or use a thin mirror on the blade.

Some felt I should change the R2 value to much higher e.g. 100k resistor and reduce R1 to 68 to 72 ohm.

Any comments so far?

If that doesn't work, I might get a photo interrupter as you mentioned. But as all three blades will be going through the slit, I will need to "extend" the one blade so that only one out of three goes through the slit and triggers the switch. What material would you suggest? I really like the photo interrupter possibility. Please look at the following site and advise. The dealer is close to me

Since you already have it designed and built I would first try mounting the sensor about 1mm away from the area to be detected and see if it works. That is the distance it was designed for. I am thinking that the LED and transistor optics are probably angled so that it will reflect best against a surface that is at the specified distance so with this device I don't think you will ever get good range.

As a final check on the cables, measure between the zero volt point on the detector circuit and the zero volt point on the mouse. The projector state doesn't matter for this one. This should of course be zero or very close to it.

Does the beam need to be broken in that first 1mm transparent part, or does the object need to go deeper in the slit?

If so, I can try to mount it close to two movable parts, that move only when a frame advances (so it is stationary and then either move down- that white piece)

Or to the right:

These two possible trigger points are very consistent.

So, should I try this optical switch, I need to know the following
1. How deep should the object need to go in the slit (because if it needs to go deeper, it might be difficult)II thought of attaching a rigid plastic to the "moving" side of one ot the trigger points.
2. What wires should be connected to what pins (For me this is very important, being a newbie to electronics)
3. Do I need resistors?

I am not really sure what wire should go to what pin. Is it possible to number them for me next to the sensor? (Does it start right top with nr 1 and then clockwise to nr 4 next to 1?) Remember James changed the numbering on the diagram